Question

I am looking for Rankins in Chicago and Kansas City, MO from 1850-1950s.

Comments

To help you better, can you clarify whether you are asking about ways to look for people named Rankin, or are you looking for specific people?

In general, you can look here on wikitree for Rankins:

* go to any non-G2G page to start with. E.g., in the upper right-hand corner of this screen is a dropdown menu labeled My WikiTree. Place your mouse over those words and click on Profile to bring up your own profile page.

* In the upper left-hand corner of that page, there is a text box labeled Surname. Enter "rankins" (without the quotation marks) and click on the Go button next to it.

* If there's a specific name you're interested in, enter the name in the Full Name box instead (e.g., "john rankins") and click the Go button.

* There are some 1300 Rankins on wikitree, but you can browse the list by name or birthdate (for instance) by clicking on the Name or Birth column headers to sort them by that category.

Answer 1

Try the free search tool at: https://familysearch.org/search    You can plug in first names, maiden names, b, m, d date ranges as well.  See examples below, maybe you might recognize some of the names listed.

Example:  Rankins:Residence Chicago, IL 1850-1900

https://familysearch.org/search/record/results#count=20&query=%2Bsurname%3Arankins~%20%2Bresidence_place%3A%22chicago%2C%20IL%22~%20%2Bresidence_year%3A1850-1900~

Rankins Residence Kansas City, MO 1850- 1940

https://familysearch.org/search/record/results#count=20&query=%2Bsurname%3ARankins~%20%2Bresidence_place%3A%22Kansas%20city%2C%20MO%22~%20%2Bresidence_year%3A1850-1940~

Comments

Thank you so much! I'm so new to WikiTree and didn't know i could do that. :)

Answer 2

Another great resource is a book about jacob pursley and rachel rankin. UNfortunatelly there are only a limited number of them (Im actually working on aquiring one from my great aunt who wrote it) She's a genealogist so basically it traces it back as far as Jacob and rachel and then goes foreword from there. Its called Jacob Pursley and rachel rankin:Their decendents.... I dont remember the rest but it written by kathy shermick. just go to google books and type in jacob and rachel rankin it should pop up. There are two libraries that have copies one in fort wayne and one in ohio. You should see if your local library can borrow it from one of them for you, I do know some libraries will do that.

Answer 3

My grandmother was juanita rankin married to cecil denver briggs in kansas city missouri. My mom was barbara cecile briggs (born sept. 26, 1937...passed away nov. 5, 2014 . )I found a 1940 census. With image and birth and death info....cant remember what site off hand...have ta look again. Juanita and cecil also had another child, a son that passed away from pnuemonia at a very young age that I cant find info on. Anyway, I have juanitas parents names etc, just new at this. If you happen upon a pem briggs, 1963 please let me know..I will send the info I have to you